The kind-hearted Karu Jayasuriya of UNP team
Posted on January 16th, 2014
C. Wijeyawickrema
Karu Jayasuriya (KJ) says it was not fair to attack the Christian evangelical church at Hikkaduwa. He talks about pluralism and freedom, just like MahindaR talks about multi-faith and multi-cultural. Nobody approves violence, but if both UNP and SLFP live on violence indirectly, then how can they talk about non-violence? Of all the people, it was KJ who supported the GOSL efforts to end Prabhakaran. Unlike the other UNP goats, KJ therefore has a sympathetic eye from the Sinhala Buddhists of Sri Lanka. But issuing statements on behalf of the demolished church without also talking about the root cause for such violence puts KJ an opportunist thinking of the Christian votes at the next election. What did fake SB UNP politicians do to control unethical conversions? Giving John Amaratunga the police which in turn used by evangelical rouge priests.
In 1971, JVP introduced violence and blood to Sri Lankan politics and ever since it had become a nasty and brutal game. It was JRJ who told people to protect themselves and now in 2014, when we visit Sri Lanka from outside we see the law of the jungle is so widespread and a norm of the everyday life. KJ, just get out of your car for fun and take a bus ride in disguise to see the real world in Sri Lanka. You will at least secretly admire Bodu Bala Sena, if you see what is going on. Like in the past before or after 1948, you all are interconnected by marriage contracts and play fool with people asking vote for UNP or SLFP.
Why I am even bothered to write this short note is that rather than reacting to this incident or that incident thinking that you the UNP team can gain this vote or that vote, present to the country why and how you, KJ, can be a different kind of animal. The country is in a mess because of what JRJ, RP, RW, CBK (and now MR) did to the country. Think of Dengue, why is that the country cannot get rid of it. Think of Kidney disease. What can you do as the UNP team. Think of education, university education, Halal issue, Saudi Arab religious university, kudu business, ethanol, road deaths, Boru police, crime, corruption etc. What is that you, KJ can do? Perhaps, prepare a Karu Chinathayak.
Why do you think people are attacking these churches? Because people like you both UNP and SLFP did not do anything to prevent illegal and unethical conversions. Did you know that when Christian priests went on customer-hunting in the late 1800s and early to mid-1900s, they spent the night in remote village temples such as in Baddegama as the night guest of the temple monks? The monk even cooked dinner for these conversion guys, even though monks themselves did not eat dinner other than drinking water.
The SB’s have now become like the proverbial kind hearted woman. What is happening now is not religious freedom. This is new colonialism coming as converting people into brainless sheep. This is all dollar-based NGO work to make Sri Lanka another South Korea or a Philippine island. Have you ever thought for a moment that when one is converted to Christianity that person’s power of critical thinking is erased or removed? It is no longer a case of “Come and examine, but come and believe.” See what had happened to Neville Jayaweera, Lalith Kotalawala, MG Mendis or Mrs. Premadasa and her daughter? This is the main reason why these unethical conversions must be stopped by law. It does not matter if adults, parents, become Christian to get a job or a box of milk or cake. But when they do that their younger children also get under the Church control. These children will never get a chance to critically analyze what religion is reasonable, rational or not, because that power is robbed from them when they were children, growing up with the bribed parents. It is an R2P issue.
So when rulers are unjust, stupid and the alternative or ex-rulers are also unjust, stupid and waiting for the next incident to use it as a vote catching item, no wonder people throw rocks at evangelical buildings. When law becomes a joke or when people in the UNP and SLFP make law a joke do not expect people to take law seriously. I hope you, KJ, gets a chance to read this.
January 16th, 2014 at 12:32 pm
Well said CW.
“Why do you think people are attacking these churches? Because people like you both UNP and SLFP did not do anything to prevent illegal and unethical conversions.”
First stop illegal conversions and then these attacks will stop by itself.
Add to the list Dayasiri Jayasekera who also changed his religion to that of Rosy Senanayake (was dating him for a while).
When WAHABIS take this to their advantage things will be even worse!! Then THEY will BOMB temples, kovils, churches and mosques.
January 17th, 2014 at 5:01 am
KJ is just another politician and even his votes were less than “Paba’s” in Gampaha District. He was an ardent supporter of mass murder Premadasa. During 1989 era Premadasa, Ranil.W clique killed more than 600 Buddhist priests and 60,000 Sinhala youth, with the help of St Benedict’s Waidyaratne, Algama and Janaka Perera’s “operation combine”, this is the highest death toll of Buddhists priests by a Sinhala ruler. (Tamil invaders, Portugese, Dutch and British invaders excluded) What did “kind hearted” KJ did to stop Premadasa’s killings. Had he took this issue in the central committee or working committee of the U.N.P?
Gangodawila Soma thero’s unsolved sudden death was not a question to “kind hearted” KJ? It was an organized murder case by Kotalawala and Catholic Church. When Gatambe temple was attacked by U.N.P thugs “kind hearted” KJ was silenced. Getambe priest Dr. Labuduwe Siridamma thero’s sudden death was not a question to KJ. When U.N.P thugs attacked to Maduluwawe Sobitha thero, it was not an issue to KJ.
When tamil terrorists attacked Kaththankudi mosque it was not KJ’s subject. For the U.N.P and NGO’s hearts get melted when something happened to Catholics or tamils. For them Sinhala Buddhists and Muslims are not humans. If a politician is a true and genuine he/she should defend every citizen and every religion equally no matter whom they are. Can we categorise K.J as true gentlemen?
But at the end it is not a solution to attack other religions by Buddhists. We are going for a big mess if we continue to do so. It can highlight by our enemy’s with bold letters. BBC and Tamil net are welcome similar reports and for them it is front page news.
Even Lord Buddha took Lichchawi kingdom as an example country as they followed seven principals. Respect “other religions” is one of them. If Sinhala Buddhists converts to other religions means something wrong with us. It is not their fault. If so why can’t we convert Christians, Muslims and Tamils to Buddhism? Why not our Buddhist priests doing it?
The service done to Buddhism by Rev Anagarika Dharmapala was enormous and known to most Sri Lankans. He was not ordained and refused to be a Buddhist priest at Asgiri and Malwatu temples? Therefore he went to India and ordained as Siri Dewamittha thero. If the treatment to Dharmapala thero was that what about the ordinary Buddhist get? C.J we have to clean our back yard first.
It is high time our Buddhist priests to change their feudalist attitudes and to change the preaching’s logically, scientifically that suits to modern world as did Lord Buddha 2500 years ago. If not, no one can stop the conversions.
January 17th, 2014 at 7:59 am
Some points re the topic of Buddhism and good governance :
* Rev. Walpola Rahula’s book “What the Buddha Taught” should be the text to teach Buddhism in Lanka schools. It is so clearly written, no ambiguities. I wonder whether translations are available in Sinhela & Tamil ? Late Rev.Piyadassi of Vajirama also brought Buddhism alive for school children. The Buddhist priests were gems in the Sasana in the 1950s & 60s.
We wish Lanka many thousands of such pragmatic and wise Buddhist priests.
* Colonisation, Cold War and aftermath have taken its toll on Buddhist activities in Sri Lanka. Some poor folk think that an instant raise in social standing is to convert to other religions, usually done also for funds, jobs, education, favors, marriages, etc. Rarely are conversions done through devotion, understanding and faith in those religions. Conversion for the wrong reason is a kind of spiritual death.
* The poorer the people the more susceptible they are to conversions, particularly for funds. Such people can be used by unscrupulous folk for mischievous acts, even acts dangerous to society. Such conversions end up with a bunch of confused people : ‘hitapu athath nae, payagahapu athath nae’ (lost both the branch he was sitting on as well as the branch he merely stepped on).
* It is up to ALL the leaders of society, Politicians, Clergy, Teachers, Parents, Law enforcement agencies, etc. to instruct children on forced/fooled Conversions, illicit, Drugs, illicit sex, etc.
January 17th, 2014 at 10:48 am
Don’t forget this guy; Karu J. in white clads to hoodwink Sinhala/Buddhist masses announced a few years ago that SL must conduct a credible investigation to find out excesses alleged to have been committed by SL Army during the last stage of the Eelam war. It is the same demand made by UN, the USA, UK and India. In that respect K.J. is a real enemy of our beloved motherland!
January 17th, 2014 at 4:47 pm
Spot on Mr Wijayawickrema and thank you for your candid article. Evangelists who cry for human rights are the very people who deny such rights by offering money and gifts to desperate people on the strict condition that they destroy Buddhist or Hindu statues and burn Buddhist or Hindu religious books and also, demand their children attend church. This is conversion at the most vicious and disgraceful level, since the times of the Colonial powers. Changing one’s faith is quite OK based on one’s free conviction, but forced change practiced by Evangelists is bordering on criminality and could generate equally bad reactions from those who cannot bear to see the exploitation of helpless people by these Evangelists. To me Evangelists and Thaliban are two sides of the same coin, they are destructive forces, making people ignorant puppets of their establishments. The Government has to enact laws to prevent the erection of shrines, sheds or renting houses to establish places of religious worship at every nook and corner, whether Buddhist, Christian, Hindu or Muslim, as happening around the country today.
January 17th, 2014 at 7:00 pm
I think KJ is another inmate in Ranils prison. Progressives in the party should ask him to contest wpc if he wants to prove his mettle. If he wins he should be able to make necessary reforms and take full control. In my opinion he is the only one who has an outside chance of doing it.
January 17th, 2014 at 11:18 pm
HOLY MACKEREL!!
“A nun who gave birth to a baby boy in the central Italian city of Rieti, said she had no idea she was pregnant, local media report.
The 31-year-old was rushed to hospital with abdominal pains, which she thought were stomach cramps.
The young mother, who is originally from El Salvador, reportedly named her newborn Francis after the current Pope.
The mayor of Rieti, Simone Petrangeli has appealed to the public and media to respect the woman’s privacy.
The news has drawn international attention to the small city of 47,700 inhabitants.
The nun called the ambulance on Wednesday morning. A few hours later she gave birth to a healthy baby boy.
“I did not know I was pregnant. I only felt a stomach pain,” she was quoted as saying by the Ansa news agency.
People at the hospital have begun collecting clothes and donations for the mother and her child, Italian media say.
The woman belongs to a convent near Rieti, which manages an old people’s home.
Fellow nuns at the convent said they were “surprised” by the news.
Local pastor Don Fabrizio Borrello told journalists that the nun planned to take care of the baby.”
– bbc
A Tamil pregnant woman should be paid and brought before the media claiming Kasippu Joseph Goebbels is the father of the child! Make a big hue and cry and get him sacked (or the woman’s friend takes revenge). Then the woman hangs herself!
One stone, 4 birds.
January 18th, 2014 at 12:36 am
Lorenzo,
Sounds like Jesus has come back to the world. May be he will educate the west – we have to wait 20 years.
You are so cruel. Poor child and the woman.
Kasippu surely must have done a lot of crimes. Catch him for a real one !
January 18th, 2014 at 1:36 am
Nanda,
“You are so cruel. Poor child and the woman.
Kasippu surely must have done a lot of crimes. Catch him for a real one !”
It is required to SAVE the nation. ALL secret services in the world does these things and FAR WORSE.
Just 2 casualties. 20 million saved.
Catching him for a real crime is difficult. He would have done those things in his young days. Those women must be dead by now due to war, old age, etc.
January 19th, 2014 at 9:17 am
Re the comment I made earlier “The Buddhist priests were gems in the Sasana in the 1950s & 60s” : There is an exception to this statement in that the worst crime ever committed by a Buddhist priest also happened in that time frame. Buddharakitha priest of Kelaniya Temple inspired an Ayurvedic doctor by the name of Somarama to assassinate then PM SWRD Bandaranaike.
Bad times and good times mixed into this era.